My friend has a swarm that has made a home in a hollow log bird house hanging on his fence in the backyard. He said that he can see their nest in there, and lots of bees, but he is not a bee guy and not sure if they are bees or not, first of all he does not know that there is a difference in flying insects that sting. I think that honeybees are the only ones that draw comb and if he saw comb he's got a swarm. I have an empty foundation hive ready to go, so my question is, do you think I can catch it? It sounds like the log might be small enough to nearly fit into the hive box, but if not, can I dump them out of it and into the box? Would I spray them with syrup like I did my packaged bees before I do anything? Do I just need to dig through and find the queen if I have to dump them out, or just dump them out? Also, the queen of a swarm is the old one...do I need to requeen? And my package is still very small, only two weeks old, can I add those bees to my package, sans their queen, to bump up the numbers? I feel pretty confident that I can catch a swarm, just not sure exactly how to do it...any advice would be appreciated!

if there is comb, its not a swarm, its a hive. That means they wont be all nice and gentle like a swarm would. Also be aware that bumble bees make comb too. I am sure that the folks here will give you some good advice on removing an existing hive. I too am working up to a hive removal.

Bumble bees don't make comb. They make a handfull of marble size pouches. They are very gentle when working, but start digging up one ot their nests, and they definitely change demeanor. They have a curved, unbarbed stinger and they will sting your over and over. The stinger is large and will draw blood. I've dug up a few and they can be brutal.

Tell your friend to get a new birdhouse because you'll have to take apart this one ( thus destroying it ) if you want to hive this colony. More than one way to do it. Depending on how the birdhouse is constructed and assuming it has a top, I would just pry off the top and spray sugar water heavily on the colony to calm them down of course, wait a few minutes and then remove the BH from the fence and dump the bees into a nuc or hive with frames of drawn comb or foundation as if it were a package, keep an eye out for the QUEEN, you want her in the hive, close it up and lay the BH in front of the hive and wait a day for the rest of them to move in. It may work, it may not. I am sure someone else with more experience will chime in to help with a better technique, but this is what I would do. Happy Free Bees.